A Turkish court on Sunday ordered Ertan Aydın, a former adviser to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and former ruling party lawmaker, jailed pending trial in an investment fund investigation after prosecutors challenged a decision to put him under house arrest, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
Aydın was first detained on October 22 and appeared before a judge on October 24. The judge initially imposed house arrest and a ban on foreign travel, but prosecutors appealed. Police detained him again in Ankara on October 25 and transferred him to İstanbul, where a court ordered his pretrial detention.
His detention comes amid a growing investigation into alleged market manipulation following an investment fund crisis that left nearly half a million people unable to access their savings.
The Capital Markets Board (SPK), Turkey’s securities regulator, filed criminal complaints against Aydın and 21 others over transactions involving shares in Vişne Madencilik, a mining company.
Prosecutors say the latest phase of the investigation concerns trading in shares of four companies: Işıklar Enerji, Vişne Madencilik, Odine Solutions and Tera Finansal Yatırımlar Holding. The inquiry followed reports and complaints submitted by the SPK.
Aydın served on the board of Tera Yatırım, a brokerage at the center of the fund crisis, for about five months in 2025 before resigning in June. The group’s fund-management subsidiary, Tera Portföy, was among the companies whose funds failed to meet investors’ withdrawal requests in September.
Some of those funds had large stakes in thinly traded shares that could not be sold quickly without driving down prices, leaving them struggling to raise cash to repay investors. Tera founder Emre Tezmen and Tera Portföy general manager Alper Öztürk were among the executives jailed pending trial on September 23 as the investigation expanded.
In an earlier account of his role, Aydın told journalist İsmail Saymaz that he had signed no documents during his tenure and had been unaware of the funds under investigation. He said he left after noticing problems at the company, according to the Diken news website.
Aydın became Erdoğan’s chief adviser on political affairs in 2012, when Erdoğan was prime minister, and continued in the role under his successor, Ahmet Davutoğlu. He was elected to parliament for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2015 and coordinated the team behind its “Century of Turkey” election campaign ahead of the 2023 elections. He also co-founded the Pollmark polling company.
In a separate development in the fund investigation, a court ordered Gürol Sami Özer, a deputy general manager of insurer Türkiye Sigorta, jailed pending trial. The company announced Monday that its board had terminated his employment, according to Anadolu.
The fund crisis erupted in September when investment funds failed to meet withdrawal requests. The SPK ordered the liquidation of 131 funds managed by seven companies, requiring their assets to be sold to repay investors. Prosecutors are investigating allegations that fund managers bought shares in little-known companies to inflate their prices.
Parliament last week approved legislation governing repayments and the recovery of assets unlawfully removed from the funds. It allows interim payments of up to 1 million lira, about $20,000, and inflation adjustments when calculating repayment.
The post Former Erdoğan adviser jailed in Turkey’s investment fund investigation appeared first on Turkish Minute.